


Debt of Blood

by pentapus, theLiterator



Category: Batman (Comics), Batman - All Media Types, Grayson (Comics)
Genre: All-Caste, Angst, Brother Feels, Dark, Gen, Homecoming, Hurt/Comfort, Lazarus Pit, League of Assassins - Freeform, M/M, Nanda Parbat, Spyral
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-02
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-29 01:56:44
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 15,211
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7665850
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/pentapus/pseuds/pentapus, https://archiveofourown.org/users/theLiterator/pseuds/theLiterator
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Spyral sends Dick and Tiger out to gather intel about the League of Assassins, and Dick finds someone he never expected to see alive again.</p><p>His three missions are at odds with one another, but in the end, he makes the only choice he knows how to make, and, much to Tiger's surprise, everything works out in the end.</p><p>But is it really all that surprising?</p>
            </blockquote>





	Debt of Blood

**Author's Note:**

> Art by Pentapus.
> 
> Beta'd by basically everyone I know, thank you so much for your patience, understanding, and massive amounts of help.

# Debt of Blood

Dick was doing his best to keep his head down and blend in with the other low-level members of the League, up to and including weapons practice with edged blades. A fact that made him like the League of Shadows even less than he had before, which, until a week ago, he’d have thought was impossible.

He was focusing on sparring with his partner, using escrima to keep him at bay and doing his best to avoid any disabling maneuvers from his opponent, but the live steel made him jumpy.

Someone yelped, and he heard someone call out a rebuke in the League’s bastardized mishmash of Arabic and older languages.

“If you are too careless to keep from drawing blood in _practice_ , then you are too clumsy for my Grandfather’s League,” he said, and it was that; it was ‘Grandfather’ said with familiar arrogance and the voice was _almost_ right, rough in unfamiliar places, a strained edge to the words that Dick would never have tolerated, but… still.

Dick signals for a break, which is unnecessary; his partner has turned his attention to someone else, and they are muttering together in… French? Something, but it doesn’t matter, not in the face of—

The boy is the right age — maybe fourteen or so — eyes glinting green and furious in the dim light of the salle, wearing black robes, richly embroidered in gold, with a blade on either hip and his mouth a thin line of anger.

“You may leave,” he added.

“But they’re sharp!” someone protested, and Damian— because who the hell _else_ could it be, dead or not, with that face and that voice and that disdain.

“Here,” Damian snapped, drawing both blades and squaring off. “I’ll do you the favor of teaching you.”

The man who’d presumably cut his opponent snorted and strode up to face off against Damian, the set of his shoulders showing nothing but confidence.

And why shouldn’t he be confident? He was twice the kid’s size. Except— if it truly was Damian — then the man didn’t stand a chance.

The match went well, Damian making every move look effortless, including the subtle flick of his wrist so he only ever made contact with the dull edge of his katana.

The crowd of would-be assassins kept shifting, jostling Dick around and pushing him further back, which he didn’t actually mind, no matter the way his gut clenched as his view of the sparring match became partially obscured.

The last thing he needed was to blow his assignment trying to make contact with this person who could not possibly be his dead Robin.

“This… is… insane…” the man Damian was sparring with gasped. “I yield!”

Damian scoffed and disarmed the man, his sword, far broader and heavier than Damian’s, hitting the ground with a resounding crash.

“Of course you do,” Damian snapped. He sheathed his weapons, adjusted golden bracers, and smoothed his robes, looking entirely too much like Ra’s for Dick’s comfort.

Suddenly, the room erupted into motion, half the people rushing for Damian, blades of various sizes and shapes freed from their sheathes, too many of them at once for even Damian to fend off, except that he _did_.

His katana were both back in hand in the blink of an eye, and he parried the first attacks without flinching. He didn’t restrict himself to bladework either, disarming one of the attackers with a strong kick, avoiding the blade of another with a backflip that—

Dick made a noise. He hardly intended it, a little burst of concern that he couldn’t hold silent, so certain that Damian wouldn’t be able to land solidly enough to keep them from taking advantage. That was an _escape_ move, not a simple dodge, you could only do that in an open area, on the edge of a roof, to buy a few seconds lead—

Damian looked right at him, which was _impossible_. The Hypnos implant meant that he was all but invisible in a crowd but still Damian looked at him, and it was for a moment too long because someone caught a slash across his face and blood bloomed bright on Damian’s cheek, stealing his attention. A swift motion and someone’s arm was on the floor, someone was screaming, and Damian’s expression didn’t change, even under the blood that was rapidly covering his face.

The sound of weapons dropping to the floor filled the room, and the crowd moved back en masse, spurring Dick forward.

He unwound the scarf from his head and made a pad of material with it, pressing it to Damian’s bleeding face, forcing him to tilt his head so Dick could see that it had missed the eye. It must have been an upward slash, because it seemed deepest at the hollow of Damian’s cheek, and there was a little graze through his eyebrow.

He must have jerked back as soon as he felt the impact, and Dick frowned, adjusting the positioning of the cloth and pressing hard. Head wounds always bled awfully, but _that_ would almost certainly need stitching.

Dick wanted desperately to seize Damian in his arms and haul him away, but he was half-convinced that if he tried, Damian would cut off both of _his_ arms.

“I am Damian al Ghul,” Damian said coldly to the room at large. “Grandson of Ra’s al Ghul and Heir to the Demon.; All of your lives are forfeit for such a cowardly assault, but I will not collect my due. Be grateful for my mercy.”

A pause, and Damian’s fingers twitched, which Dick only noticed because of how close he was.

“You are _pathetic_ ,” he spat. “Bested as a group by a lone child. See that this _mess_ is cleared up before I think to practice again.”

Dick drew back, unsure, and Damian’s hand locked around his wrist. “ _You_ will attend me.”

Dick nodded, then stuttered out, “Yes, my lord.” It felt awkward and weird to call _Damian_ that, of all people, but _this_ Damian was violent and stiff with pride, and he was pretty sure that calling him a brat and ruffling up his hair would blow his cover.

Also probably get him maimed. Just all around not a good choice, no matter how much it ached to not make it.

Damian scoffed and turned, sweeping out of the salle with Dick trailing behind him.

They wended their way through the labyrinthine corridors of Nanda Parbat and eventually Damian stopped short in front of a door with a palm lock.

“Why did you help?” Damian asked quietly, back to Dick.

“You may be the greatest assassin in the world,” Dick said firmly, “But you still look like a kid, and I have a little brother your age.”

“What’s his name?” Damian asked politely, genuine interest in his expression, and Dick froze. He’d thought only the frightened, cornered creature was left, and the arrogance that shielded it. Not _his_ Damian, who cared about little kids and helpless animals.

“I— uh, my lord Damian, maybe that’s not—”

Damian snorted and struggled with the mass of fabric that were his robes. “You can hardly assume I won’t allow you to take liberties _now_.”

“Yeah,” Dick said. “Tim,” he said firmly, the first name that came to mind. Which, technically true. Still, he was pretty sure that was the stupidest thing he’d said in at least a week.

Damian froze.

“Tim,” he repeated.

Dick shrugged, even though Damian couldn’t see him.

Finally, Damian pressed his palm to the lock and the door swept open to reveal a luxurious suite of rooms of the sort of opulence that Dick hadn’t ever really _understood_ , not even after a decade of being Bruce Wayne’s ward.

Damian led the way through the room into a well-appointed bathroom, where he opened up a cabinet and handed Dick a basket of medical supplies.

“Uh,” Dick said. “Shouldn’t you call a doctor or something?” he asked.

“No,” Damian replied coldly.

“Uh, okay,” Dick replied, setting down the basket and turning to wash his hands in the sink, making sure the water was hot and that he got soap on every bit of skin.

He had to quash the desire to turn to Damian, to _tell_ Damian. Even in the complete privacy of the bathroom, the Hypnos implants could always be accessed by _anyone_ at Spyral, and his whole goal had been to figure out how much they already knew about his family, about their community, not feed them more information.

He shuddered and forced himself to think only of the heat of the water, of getting Damian cleaned up and stitched up.

When he turned back to Damian, he was seated on a stool in front of a vanity, head tilted back and the wadded up headscarf pressed firmly against his cheek.

“You _have_ done this before, haven’t you,” Damian said, voice not lilting at the end to make it a question, and Dick had to fight down his smile.

“So,” Dick said, not answering the not-question. “You’re a little short to be an assassin.”

Damian snorted. “I recognize that reference,” he said primly.

Dick had known he would. He remembered watching all of the Star Wars movies with Damian. The feeling of _warmth_ that had suffused him when Damian had dozed off after a few hours, tucked tightly into his side, eyes slitted beneath his lashes.

“Yeah? So you’ve been outside the compound? I mean, I’ve been here a couple of weeks and I haven’t seen a single television.”

Damian glared at him and Dick took that opportunity to peel the make-shift bandage away and toss it into the sink.

“I was raised here,” he snapped. “And in my mother’s personal holdings.”

“Ah,” Dick replied. “So, you’re really that? The Demon’s Head’s biological grandson? I mean, I didn’t doubt you, but I have a hard time picturing him reproducing.”

“He is very powerful,” Damian said. “Power has its own attraction.”

His prim explanation reminded Dick, painfully, of Alfred’s gentle explanations, of Damian’s voice, small and vulnerable, wondering if his mother and father had ever even _liked_ one another. There could be no doubt, Dick thought, even as he used the distilled water in the basket to gently clean the gash on Damian’s face, that this was _his_ Damian and not some clone.

But then, how was he _alive_?

“Yeah, that’s definitely true,” Dick replied. “So, Damian, you ever had stitches before?”

Damian gestured broadly and scoffed.

“Yeah, good point. Well, I won’t have to tell you it will hurt, then.”

“You’d better not do poor work,” Damian said. “If I must have a scar for my inattention, it will be a _clean_ one.”

“Or what?” Dick asked, opening the sterile packet with the threaded needle. “You’ll chop off my hands too?”

Damian winced, and Dick paused. “Keep your face relaxed or they _will_ end up pulling weird,” he instructed, and Damian relaxed.

“I was bad,” he whispered, lips barely moving.

“I doubt that,” Dick said. “You seem pretty good to me.”

“I lost my temper,” he said. “Father— my father is right; the temper is uncontrollable.”

“Your dad said that to you?” Dick said, heart stopping. If Bruce knew, and hadn’t told—

“My father has no influence in my life; I am simply aware of his opinions on such things.”

“Wow, your mom never told him about you? Tough break. But you know who he is; you could introduce yourself. I bet he’d be really happy to know his son,” Dick said, resisting the urge to smooth Damian’s hair.

“No.” Damian’s reply was flat and invited no discussion.

“No?” Dick repeated. “Okay, well, then tell me about your mom. This is going to take awhile.”

“My mother is the most beautiful woman I have ever known,” Damian said. “She is dead, now.”

“Hmm,” Dick said. “My mom passed when I was your age. I miss her a lot.”

“My mother,” Damian said slowly. “Was troubled. She—”

He shut his eyes and Dick bit his lip, trying to focus on his stitching.

“She ordered me killed, and… she raised a clone of mine to kill me. My father killed her in retaliation.” Dick wanted to say something about _that_ , but he didn’t know _what_ , exactly, so he ignored the blatant inaccuracy and moved on.

“Wow,” Dick said. “So… you actually died? How’s that work.”

“Do not play ignorant,” Damian snapped. Dick tapped his cheek to remind him to relax and after a moment his face went slack again. “My grandfather has mastered death itself. Everyone knows this.”

“And he let your mom die, but not you?”

“She was an unworthy Heir. I am not.”

Dick made some noise of assent and couldn’t think of anything else to say to Damian that wouldn’t wreck his mission, especially if Damian had, for some _insane_ reason, truly sided with Ra’s. If Bruce did not know of Damian’s resurrection, then there was no way he was here as Bruce’s agent.

Not that Dick had really thought that of Bruce.

Except—

Dick sighed and tied off the last of the stitches. He grabbed all of the trash and the headscarf from the sink and dumped it all into the trashcan.

“What is your name?” Damian demanded suddenly. He looked grotesque with the line of black stitches and the angry red of his wound.

“Uh, Will,” Dick replied, struggling briefly to remember the identity Matron had given him, to divest himself of ‘Dick Grason’ and remember who he was supposed to be to keep Tiger’s flawless cover intact. “Will Thompson.”

“You’re American,” Damian said, in English, sounding surprised.

“Yeah,” Dick said.

“You speak League Arabic very well for a newcomer,” Damian pointed out with a suspicious glare.

“Yeah,” Dick said. “I traveled a lot as a kid; pick up languages real easy.”

Damian sent him one last sidelong glare and left the bathroom.

By the time Dick had collected his wits about himself enough to follow him, Damian was halfway changed, holding new robes the color of dried blood, still with the elaborate golden embroidery. He tossed Dick a new headscarf, this one made of silk instead of cotton, running like water between his fingers.

When Damian turned around, Dick could see that his shoulder was mottled with bruises, like he’d taken a bad fall, and he winced in sympathy.

“Have you iced that?” Dick asked, and Damian’s back went rigid.

“You take too many liberties,” he hissed.

Dick shrugged even though Damian couldn’t see him. “Thought you said we’d crossed that bridge.”

“I changed my mind,” Damian snapped.

“Right,” Dick replied, watching as Damian struggled to get the… shirt. Thing. Over his head with his limited mobility. Dick wondered at his ability to fend off the attack earlier.

The door opened behind them, and Dick whirled, catching a glimpse of Ra’s al Ghul’s cold expression before he turned back to Damian. No one at Spyral had been sure whether the Hypnos would actually work on Ra’s; Dick had been wary. The waters of the Pit had many odd side effects.

When he completed his turn he could see that Damian was still stuck putting on his clothes, and Ra’s’s entrance had panicked him so he was fighting with the shirt, struggling and writhing in an effort to get it down over his head.

Dick didn’t have enough presence of mind to think through the consequences — he couldn’t bear the thought of Damian facing his _Grandfather_ from a vulnerable position — so he tugged the shirt down the rest of the way and grabbed the jacket-robe thing, thick and heavy with embroidery, and helped Damian into it. Damian’s face was stark white, and Dick had to hope that Ra’s would assume it was from blood-loss.

Damian had been too afraid to show fear when he’d come to them for it to bode any good _here_.

There was still a sash laid out on the bed, and Dick frowned at it for a moment before Damian shoved him aside and obliged Dick to turn and watch as Damian bowed to Ra’s.

Belatedly, Dick bowed as well. Less smoothly, and definitely less respectfully.

Ra’s was… evil. When Dick thought of everything the creature before him had done to his family over the years, it made his blood boil and his fists clench, and he wasn’t certain, if Ra’s decided to do anything to Damian, that he would be able to stay still.

“Damian,” Ra’s intoned. “Rumor has informed me of an attempt on your life.”

Because it wasn’t like Ra’s hadn’t _encouraged_ the new recruits to try to kill his Heir. _”If any of you can best any member of my court, you may take his place,”_ wasn’t going to convince anyone to leave Damian alone.

“Grandfather,” Damian said warily.

“And of the continued survival of your would-be killers. It would grieve my heart to lose you again, Damian,” Ra’s said, his tone never changing.

He seemed about as grieved as a housecat in sunshine, Dick thought.

“They did not succeed,” Damian said.

“Your father’s weakness corrupts you, Damian.”

Damian’s spine was rigid, and he was balanced on the balls of his feet, ready to attack, ready to _defend_.

“And yet,” Damian bit out, “You chose him. You chose _me_.”

“Yes,” Ra’s said. “So long as you remember his _hypocrisy_ ; his _lies_.”

“My father—”

“ _Murdered_ your mother, and allowed your beloved tutor to die while he looked on and refused to intervene. Allowed _your_ death, and only my mercy and pride in your ability brought you back,” Ra’s said steadily.

 _What?_ Dick thought, shocked. He opened his mouth, wanting to protest, because Bruce was many things, but he wasn’t—

He wasn’t _that_.

“Yes?” Ra’s demanded, making eye-contact with Dick, who flinched from the otherworldly green glint held there.

“Grandfather?” Damian asked.

“Your would-be bodyguard has something to say.”

“Only, my lord,” Dick said, throat dry, “That I am grateful for your mercy toward your heir.”

“Yes,” Ra’s said. “ _You_ would be. Remember that it was _my_ mercy that restored him.” He smiled slowly, and Dick’s blood ran cold.

Damian whirled to face Dick, eyes searching Dick’s face for whatever Ra’s had seen there. Dick hardly dared breathe. He had no idea whether he wanted Damian to recognize him or not, but Ra’s— _That_ did not bode well.

“Well, assassin,” Ra’s said. “Congratulations on your new assignment. It is a prestigious position, but not, I think, a long-lived one.”

Dick opened his mouth to reply, but before he could, Ra’s swept out of the room.

“Well,” Dick said finally.

“You displeased him,” Damian said forlornly.

“What?”

“He only tasks people who have displeased him with being my bodyguard. They usually die.”

Dick grimaced. “I’m not going to die, li— my lord Damian. You’ll keep me safe.”

Damian scoffed. “That is _your_ job, not mine.”

Dick laughed. “I’ve been dead; hasn’t stuck yet.”

Damian carefully smoothed his robe down and wrapped the silk sash in place. Finally, he looked up at Dick, catching his gaze. “The same applies to me,” he said coolly, and Dick realized it was a threat, or perhaps fear showing through the cracks of Damian’s facade.

“I’m not going to try to kill you,” Dick said gently.

Damian snorted. “He will find the prize that best pleases you, and then I will have to dispose of _you_ as well.” He dropped his gaze, and Dick felt cold all over. “It is what I have earned.”

“I don’t believe that for a second,” Dick said. Damian turned away, and Dick grabbed his shoulder, remembering only once Damian winced that it had been injured. “Sorry,” he mumbled. “But anyway, you’re thirteen, right? What the hell could you have done in your life to _earn_ having the men you trust to _protect_ you try to kill you?”

Damian didn’t turn back, or shrug off Dick’s hand.

“It does not concern you,” he snarled, his voice cracking.

 _Everything about you is my concern,_ Dick wanted to shout, but he _couldn’t_. His mission was at stake, here, and it was fairly important. More important, he had to convince himself, than Damian’s peace of mind.

He had to believe that.

“Hey, show me how to wrap this?” Dick said, moving around to face Damian, the headscarf in hand. “One of the other guys does it for me in the mornings, and I haven’t exactly gotten _better_ at it since… I joined.”

Damian glared at him, green glinting in his gaze, and Dick locked every muscle in his body in an effort not to recoil.

Because of _course_ that was how Damian could be _here_ , alive. 

“Damian…” The name burst from him without his input, filled with every ounce of longing and love he felt, and Damian blinked in surprise, so his eyes were blue again, Bruce’s eyes, and Dick let out a breath.

“I am not your brother,” Damian said. “You would do well to keep that in mind.”

“What?” Dick demanded, half turning to the mirror to make sure the Hypnos were still working.

“Tim. You said his name was Tim, and if you would prefer he survive to adulthood, you should remember that _I am not him_ ,” the last was hissed furiously, but at least his eyes weren’t reflecting the Pit anymore.

“My lord Damian,” Dick said gently. “I lied.”

“Hmph,” Damian said, seizing the headscarf from him. “Kneel.”

Dick complied and let Damian tilt his head so he could tie the scarf. His hands were deft in the task, and gentler than his tone would imply. Dick was reminded, vividly, of Damian tending to Titus that time Alfred had left the fridge door ajar and Titus had been sick for _hours_. Like, Damian didn’t particularly _want_ to help Dick with his clothes, but he _would_ , and he’d do it _well_ , whether Dick cared or not.

Dick cared.

“So you don’t have a brother?” Damian demanded.

“Not… not anymore. He’s… I did some really stupid stuff, listened to some stupid people, and now he thinks I’m dead. So not really, not anymore.”

“The League will still kill him, if you fail. They won’t care if he knows your face,” Damian said.

“Fail in what though?”

Damian tucked a last corner of fabric against Dick’s head, his fingers warm against Dick’s skin. He scoffed.

“Come,” Damian said. “I have instruction in finance in the library in a few minutes; I will not be late.”

Dick nodded and Damian jerked his hand away, whisking out the door in a fluid motion that echoed Ra’s’s.

***

Damian did not like his new bodyguard.

He had, at first, entertained the notion of perhaps not _dis_ liking Will, but then Grandfather had come in and smiled like there was some secret he knew that Damian did not, and Damian was fairly convinced that Ra’s wouldn’t do that if it weren’t true.

Certainly, Grandfather did like playing games but also preferred they came of honest actions, not deception.

Deception, after all, was a tool to be used on enemies.

Will was, at least, well-versed on how a bodyguard might behave, despite the fact he had only been assigned the duty that afternoon.

Damian’s cheek itched where Will had sewn it up, and he wondered if it might be more convenient to use the waters of the Pit to heal it. Then he remembered the dizzyingly hot _fury_ that had overwhelmed him and cost a man his arm, and decided against it.

Will was standing calmly in the doorway of the library while Damian tried to pay attention to the information about accounting and numbers; information that would be useless now—

He was corrupt.

Damian glanced back at Will, and shook his head to disrupt the thoughts, but—

He must at least be _corrupting_ , because Will was no more kind and earnest than any of his seven previous bodyguards, and every one of them had decided to kill him eventually.

No wonder his father rejected those the Pit had affected; there was something uncannily wrong with his grandfather; something wrong with _him_

“Your focus still hasn’t improved,” his tutor snapped.

Damian looked at him. He felt very tired.

“He was injured today,” Will said, a familiar note to his voice, an older brother interfering for his sibling, perhaps. He stared at Will, and green crept around the edges of his vision. He felt like he was drowning, dying, _living_.

 _Injured?_ he thought. What _right_ did Will have to so casually display his weaknesses for all to see? _Injured?!_

He lunged at Will then, twisting his arm and finding a pressure point to force him to his knees. “Who gave you leave to speak?!” he demanded, feeling muddied and corrupt and realizing he did not _care_ whether he killed Will or not. _He_ did _though, he did._

Will tilted his head to make eye-contact. His eyes were unnervingly blue, and for a brief second his face seemed to resolve from the bland mundanity of his generically attractive features to _Grayson’s_ face, and Damian dug his fingers in _hard_ against the pressure point.

He was _angry_. He was often angry, of course. The anger that had been honed into him from the time he could walk, trained into his very soul in order to make _him_ his grandfather’s finest heir was as familiar as his own heartbeat. The anger of the Pit though, it was a special madness, a madness that separated reason from his body and made him—

Will hadn’t meant any malice, he tried to remember, the fraternal concern in that voice finally seeping into his awareness. _He was inj—_

Damian had had a brother once. Brothers.

No more.

“You will guard your tongue,” he hissed, “Or I will cut it out and feed it to your brother.”

“He is injured most days,” Damian’s tutor replied placidly. “He must still learn.”

Damian snorted and looked up at his tutor, whose expression belied the fear his voice had not. “Why?” he demanded.

His tutor licked his lips. “Your father’s business—”

“Will pass to my next oldest brother— his only living son. _Why?_ ” he snarled the last.

Will sucked in a breath, and Damian wondered what he was thinking. Would he side with the tutor after all? Would he fight Damian off? Would he—

“Yeah, clearly the blood loss is getting to him. I think we’ll just go raid the kitchens or something; he’ll be in a better mood, uh… next time.” Will curled his hand lightly around Damian’s wrist and nudged it aside.

“C’mon, you’ll have to show me where we’re going,” he said in a voice pitched just for Damian’s ears, and Damian, completely baffled, nodded and loosened his hold. The green had receded from his vision, leaving him even more exhausted, though he knew he’d never be able to show it.

They were halfway to the kitchens before Damian regained full awareness of his surroundings. It was a pitiful demonstration of his current vulnerability. He gritted his teeth, eyeing Will. 

"You're not very good at this," Damian told him as they entered the kitchen. "Most of my bodyguards know to be seen and not heard. You _will_ learn."

"That would be my fault then, my lord Damian," a new voice cut in. "It seems I have been remiss in his training."

Damian raised his eyebrow and crossed his arms over his chest, glaring at the stranger. "And you are?" The man _felt_ out of place, but chillingly familiar. Damian had known him, once, he thought. His clothing was tidy, his weapons loose in their sheathes. His eyes met Damian’s and Damian glared back at him.

"Your recruiter, my lord Damian. I was recalled recently due to a… lack of skilled members in the ranks, and placed in charge of training the new inductees. This one—" the man grimaced. “I thought he had promise, my lord, but it proved to be a bad judgement on my part. You’ve been absent for _hours_ , Will.” 

Will swallowed, offering a sheepish grin. It was _wrong,_ all of it, Damian thought.

“The Tiger King of Kandahar,” Damian said suddenly, recognizing him at last. "It would seem your reputation for bloodlust and mayhem is simply a polite veneer to cover your lack of skill. He was with me. He is now my bodyguard."

The man — Tiger — barely twitched at Damian’s recognition, but his voice was thin when he asked, "Your... bodyguard, my lord?"

"Yes. Direct orders from my grandfather. And you are correct; you made a _terrible_ misjudgement in selecting him."

"I... see," Tiger said softly. He very clearly did not see, and he seemed to blame Will for his current lack of comprehension, if the glare he sent in that direction was any indication. “If I may speak with him a moment? We will of course remain close enough to defend you.”

“You should sweet-talk someone into giving you some soup, Dami-an.” And again that hesitation over the last syllable. If Will _dared_ to shorten Damian’s name, he would gut him. Only one person had ever earned that right, and it had been grudgingly given.

Damian nodded curtly, turning on his heel and realizing, abruptly, that he’d allowed himself to be sent away.

He ground his teeth and continued through the kitchen, looping back around behind some shelving and scowling at the cooks who looked as if they might comment, and settled in to eavesdrop.

It wasn’t any specific language they were speaking but several, carefully strung together. Damian knew most of them, however, and it took him only a few moments to catch the thread of their conversation.

“I know you think you’re ... But that’s _Damian al Ghul_ , do you know how many people he’s killed? You … save him. He was born to this,” Tiger said in a low growl.

“It’ll be fine,” Will replied quietly.

“When he … eight, he went on a murder spree … every continent,” Tiger hissed.

“He’s a kid,” Will said fervently. “No matter what they made him do … age, he’s just a kid and he doesn’t deserve to die … Ra’s said he’d grant whoever did it eternal life and … at his side.”

Damian didn’t want to hear any more of Will’s stupidity and altruism, not when he knew he would ultimately have to defend his own life against him, so he made his way back through the kitchens, seizing some bread and gesturing that a bowl be filled with the soup course for him. One of the cooks took initiative and filled up a tray and he nodded his pleasure in that, stacking his bread on last.

He didn’t notice that it was a setting for two until after he had collected Will with a glare and turned back out into the hallway.

***

"He is very attached to you," Damian said, as Will carefully set out the dishes on the table in Damian’s rooms. "And you to him."

Will smiled, just a touch too wide to be anything but genuine. "What makes you say that... my lord?"

Damian shot him a flat look, utterly unimpressed. "He _looked_ at you. And you at him. Do not deny it. I saw. Tell me, did you _fuck_ him to get recruited? You must have been very desperate for a job."

"What?! No! What are you saying?" Will’s shock was also all too genuine.

"Only the desperate ever come to my grandfather.” Damian said primly. “Even I was desperate. But I will warn you, because you seem to think his loyalty genuine: an attachment like that is only weakness. It will destroy you in the end.”

"Damian, I can wholeheartedly assure you that my 'personal attachments' are damned well going to help me succeed at guarding you,” Will said, leaning forward intently. For a second, Damian thought he saw Grayson again, and he flinched away. But when he forced himself to look back, he saw only Will. Damn the Pit for these _hallucinations_ anyway. He’d thought himself well past them, but apparently that was not the case.

"Do not make promises you will not keep,” Damian said finally, looking down at his soup so he couldn’t imagine that comforting lie again. “And do not trust the Tiger King of Kandahar; he has killed more than most."

"Funny, he said the same about you,” Will said warmly.

"I know,” Damian replied, and was rewarded when Will had to cough to keep from choking.

***

Tiger broke into Damian’s apartments that night, and Dick was on his feet, escrima in hand, before the door had fully opened.

He barely relaxed when he saw who it was; Tiger had been pretty adamant that Damian was bad news, earlier, and Damian’s conviction that Dick would eventually decide to try to kill him had his hackles up.

Damian was _alive_ , and Dick wouldn’t risk that changing, mission or not.

Tiger’s eyes were dark and his expression carefully blank.

“I have been told that this changes nothing,” he said. “The assignment stands.”

Dick blinked. Right. Spyral. They were worried about the re-absorbed Leviathan factions and the overall stability of the League of Shadows.

Dick shrugged. “I wouldn’t have come with you anyway,” he said quietly.

“Why not?” Tiger demanded. “What is it about _this_ child that makes you stupid?”

Dick shrugged. He still found it hard to believe that Spyral had not made the connection between Damian Wayne, Robin, and Damian al Ghul, assassin. But if they _hadn’t_ then there was no point making the association for them.

Damian shifted then, a brief noise coming from the other room.

Dick crept over to the door and peeked around it. Tiger sighed, and once Dick was certain Damian had just been moving in his sleep, he shut the door with a quiet _snick_ of noise.

“He’s… Why does it have to be specifically him? Maybe I’d feel this way about any kid in the League.”

“You would,” Tiger said, moving closer to him. “And you wouldn’t. Whoever did this for you did it backwards,” he added, reaching up for Dick’s carefully arranged layers of ninja-scarves.

Dick reached up to stop his hands. “Damian’s not as used to dragging my useless ass along for the ride as you are.”

Tiger smirked and whuffed out a laugh. “Your ass is hardly _useless_ ,” he said. “Sentimental, but skilled enough. Tell me, Agent 37. Who is he?”

“A teenager who needs a friend,” Dick said. “You know my background: why isn’t that enough?”

Tiger pulled away, all amusement fading. “You can’t save him,” he repeated, sounding almost gentle. “Grayson— _Dick_. Please, don’t— don’t try.”

“I don’t see why I shouldn’t. Besides, this position is going to be a great source of information. Why aren’t you— what aren’t you telling me?”

Tiger shook his head. “Rumors,” he said. “Myths. Lies.”

“Now who’s hiding something?” Dick said, trying to keep his tone teasing and not sharp, and mostly failing. For some reason, Tiger was making him think of Ra’s, earlier, and that wasn’t a good comparison.

“I can’t— Leave him. Screw the orders, let’s just get out of here.”

“You’ll ruin your cover,” Dick pointed out. “Tiger, what’s wrong?”

Tiger shook his head. “It will break your heart,” he said. “And that’s never been a good thing, in my experience.”

There was a cut off cry of agony from the other room, and Dick burst through the door separating them without thinking about it, Tiger on his heels with a scimitar in hand, to see Damian fighting a losing battle with his bedsheets.

“Hey, little D,” Dick murmured, already soothing, hands moving to untangle the covers from his Robin’s limbs. “Hey, it’s okay.”

Tiger sheathed his blade noisily, but he stayed in the room, just at the edge of Dick’s awareness.

Damian opened up eyes that were glowing green and otherworldly and stared at Dick with a complete lack of recognition.

It made Dick’s heart stop for a second — he’d had this nightmare, after all, over and over, of Damian being back, but different, changed, _mad_ — and then he remembered the Hypnos, his cover, everything.

“My lord Damian,” he said.

Damian was clutching at his chest with both hands, shaking very minutely. Dick forced himself to reach for Damian’s hands, even though the memory of that clone’s sword piercing his heart while Dick lay too far away was a palpable _thing_ , trying to waylay his attempts at comfort.

“I’m fine,” Damian snapped, breathless, though he turned his hands so he could clutch at Dick’s hand instead of his own chest. “It was a dream, hardly anything you can guard my body from.”

“Some dream,” Dick said. “You’re shaking.”

“I am _not_ ,” Damian snarled.

Tiger shifted, just enough to remind them he was in the room.

“Of course not,” Dick said. “My mistake, my lord. It’s very dark in here.”

“Yes,” Damian said. His fingers clenched tightly around Dick’s hand. “You should leave me to my rest.”

Dick nodded. “Or,” he said. “Tiger can guard the outer rooms, and I could guard you from in here. Just in case.”

“That—” Damian swallowed hard. “That would be acceptable.”

“Alright,” Dick said, squeezing Damian’s hands back. “It’s a date.”

Dick turned to check that Tiger had caught all that, and by the way he shook his head sadly and then ducked back through the door, Dick would bet he’d caught more than Dick had meant for him to.

Oh, well. He’d burn that bridge when he got to it.

Damian carefully smoothed out Damian’s blankets. If they’d been anywhere else, he might have hummed for him, petted his hair, held his breath for the sleep-muzzied reproof for manhandling Damian’s person.

Instead, he just waited for Damian’s breathing to even back out and then settled into the window seat to get what sleep he could.

***

Damian woke feeling ill and sore, his breath catching in his chest in a way it sometimes did, when the nightmares got bad.

At least this time the Heretic’s face, _his_ face, as perfect as a mirror-image, had melted into Grayson’s, warm and _alive_ and smiling and— Damian forced himself to roll over, to not dwell on sentiment. His mother had dwelt on sentiment, and she had gone mad and then been killed for it.

He would not follow in her footsteps.

The new guard, Will, was dozing in the window seat, and Damian stared at him. He was torn between the desire to wake him up and ensure that he was as uncomfortable as Damian felt and the desire to have his bodyguard as well-rested as possible given the sometimes hourly attempts on his life, here.

Practicality won out, and Damian slipped silently out of his bed and shut the door between his rooms quietly.

He was somehow unsurprised to find Tiger in the outer room, alert and waiting for Damian to speak.

“Thank you,” Damian said. “Your loyalty is appreciated and will be made known to Ra’s.”

Actually, Damian would tell Ra’s nothing of what had transpired here, which would better serve Tiger than if he _did_ , but such machinations were not for _freelancers_ to know.

“My lord Damian, do you like Will?” Tiger asked quietly, in tones that suggested he had no idea how to speak to people younger than him and wanted to hide it.

Damian scoffed. “He is a sentimental _fool_.” Which really, was as good as a yes. Damian… _liked_ sentiment.

Damn his mother anyway. Her mistakes had no bearing on his own.

“Yeah, he is,” Tiger said. “Don’t— He’s attached to you. He likes kids; I think he has— he has a family. And he likes kids.”

Damian narrowed his eyes at Tiger— last night, he’d only meant to anger Will by the insinuation, but— “You’re lovers,” he said, unable to keep the surprise out of his voice. “Why would you bring a lover _here_?” he asked.

Tiger smile a crooked half-smile at him and then ducked his head. “It was not my choice,” he said.

“Becoming his lover or bringing him here?” Damian asked.

“Both,” Will replied gaily from behind him. “I’m _inevitable_ ,” he added, dropping his arms around Damian’s shoulders in a warm hug that Damian jerked free from immediately.

Tiger snorted again. “If you’re quite well, my lord Damian, I have other duties to attend…”

“You’re dismissed,” Damian replied airily, waving his hand at Tiger.

If the man weren’t half-mad and, by the rumors, so enmired in violence that he didn’t know how _not_ to kill, Damian might just decide to respect him.

“So, kiddo,” Will said. “What’s the plan for the day? A turn about the gardens? Penmanship? What else do you learn here, o Heir to the Demon?”

Damian opened his mouth to retort and found he couldn’t breathe.

He refused to grab at his chest in the light of day, to expose his weakness so publicly, so he forced himself to calm down, to think clearly and rationally.

Will was frowning at him, and Damian watched as if from a great distance as he reached out a hand to check up on him, and his vision went green and vicious, and he _attacked_. 

He was _sick_ of this, this burning need to commit violence, and he was grateful that the irrational, bloody-minded mad parts of him apparently didn’t know that there was a knife in his back pocket, because otherwise he might have killed the man.

“Please,” he whispered aloud without meaning to. It was half strangled in his throat, barely a word, but Will shifted, and Damian knew he’d heard. He wasn’t sure if he was embarrassed or relieved.

Will was competent in hand-to-hand and flipped them, using his superior weight (the only thing he had that was superior to Damian) to pin him, and Damian’s hands clawed at Will’s throat, seeking blood.

“Hey, calm down,” Will said. His face wavered, and Damian didn’t want to imagine it was Grayson, who was dead and would never comfort him again, so he shut his eyes tight against the coming hallucination.

“I want to,” Damian tried to admit. His fingers clutched at Will, trying to kill, trying to hold him close, trying to make him _understand_.

“Okay,” Will said, and then he carefully arranged them so that in addition to pinning Damian, he was _holding_ him. “Breathe for me, then. Count to ten.”

His lungs felt too-small in his chest; the very act of breathing was not so simple as Will seemed to think.

His last bodyguard, when faced with this, had tried to slit his throat, Damian remembered with a sudden vivid clarity.

His lashes had been wet with tears, and Damian hadn’t understood. “It’s me or you,” he’d snarled, his knife to Damian’s throat. The bloodlust had consumed him at that, and he remembered the stop-motion feeling of disarming him, of taking the knife and slitting his throat, the salt-iron warmth of the arterial spray on his face, the sudden _relief_ he felt at the man’s death.

He remembered Ra’s walking in on the gory tableau, the heat of his hand between Damian’s shoulder blades, the way he’d said his name, like… if Ra’s al Ghul had been any other person than who he was, Damian might have imagined regret in his voice.

But Ra’s al Ghul did not feel regret, and Damian’s lungs were _fine_ , the waters of the Pit had seen to that, so he sucked in a deep breath and let it out, counting along with Will up to ten and then back again. When he opened his eyes the world was clear and vivid and real, and the anger was back under his skin where it belonged.

“You won’t speak of this,” Damian informed his bodyguard. Will sat up, ran his fingers through disheveled hair, and then looked around for the headscarf he’d lost in the scuffle.

“Speak of what, my lord?” Will said, with entirely too much deference for Damian to trust.

He’d only known the man a day, but Will was as far from deferential as anyone could be in the world Damian had been bred to.

Damian scoffed, and he caught the shine of Will’s responding smile out of the corner of his eye. The skin around his eye itched and he reached up to rub around the stitches.

“You should make yourself presentable,” Damian intoned. “Today I have _history_ lessons.”

“You know, I have some books in my stuff in the… barracks or whatever. Maybe I could go grab them?”

Damian scowled at him. “No,” he said. “Perhaps you’ll learn something useful.”

Will snorted, but his grin remained, vibrant and irrepressible and— and he would turn too. Damian could not allow himself to grow any more attached to this guard than the last.

He would _not_.

***

“My lord Ra’s,” Tiger said in a subservient murmur as he entered the room. Ra’s was eating his breakfast, and one of his tasters was dead on the floor at his feet.

Not a good morning then, but— but Tiger _owed_ Dick. He didn’t like the tie, didn’t like the affection, but it was as Dick had said earlier, throwing his arms around Damian al Ghul as if he were a proper little boy, not the future vessel of a god-king: he was _inevitable_.

“Ah,” Ra’s said. “The Tiger King of Kandahar. I must admit, I was curious about your motive in returning to us. Come, have a grape.”

Tiger smiled and slid to his knees. “You summoned me, my lord,” he said.

“Yes.”

Tiger took a grape from the untouched plate of fruit and chewed it slowly, carefully, waiting for his tongue to go numb or start burning or the flavor to turn metallic and wrong. After a minute, he deemed it safe to swallow. Ra’s watched him with snake-slit eyes.

“Yes. Yet I thought you had sworn to never return? You tried to kill me, and you fled.”

“I did kill you,” Tiger reflected.

Ra’s flicked his fingers. “If you had _meant_ it, you would not have left me there to be found.”

Tiger cocked his head, allowing it.

Ra’s must have deemed the grape as benign as Tiger felt it was, because he took the plate of fruit back and ate one himself.

“Shall I try the coffee?” Tiger asked, trying desperately not to feel amused. This was _serious_ , and lives were at stake.

Not just his and Ra’s’s and the taster’s on the floor, either.

 _Dick’s_.

Ra’s snorted, picked up the cup, and flung it away. “No, I think that would be overkill.”

The rug it hit started smoking slightly, and Tiger stared at it. “Yes,” he agreed. “It would seem so.”

“As you can see,” Ra’s said. “You are hardly the most infuriating aspect of my morning. There is no need to feign diplomacy. You never were any good at it.”

Tiger wanted to bristle at that, to argue that he was better now, he was _more_ , but he’d been a street kid from war-torn Afghanistan when Ra’s had found him, and more, arguing would simply prove Ra’s right.

“I have a favor I wish to ask,” Tiger said. Ra’s made an amused noise.

“Do you know who he is?” Ra’s asked. “The man you are about to ask a favor for. Do you know his _name?_ ”

“Will,” Tiger said. “Thompson. He’s American, he’s— he’s too soft for this.”

Ra’s smiled and curled a corpselike-hand around Tiger’s wrist. “And if I told you that his softness is the _reason_ he is now my grandson’s companion?”

“Please,” Tiger said. “He’ll kill himself to save the boy.”

“You said his name was Will?” Ra’s asked. His fingers were hot, a disconcerting counter to their appearance. Tiger would never stop expecting Ra’s’s skin to be cold.

“Yes?” Tiger said. “Have I— is he… lying?” he hoped his genuine disbelief at the idea of Dick Grayson successfully lying about anything would win through, because as much as he was willing to risk to save Dick’s worthless skin, he wasn’t willing to risk his life.

Well. Not _carelessly._

“Yes,” Ra’s said, smiling still. “But that’s quite all right. His deception serves my purposes. For now.”

“So you will throw him at the boy, and watch him die bloody,” Tiger said.

“I would throw my own _daughter_ at the boy and watch her die bloody,” Ra’s said. “Of course, that would actually _solve_ the problem, so—”

“You’re saying his _mother_ killed him?” Tiger demanded, jerking back. His own mother had died protecting him— He couldn’t— The boy was—

The boy was _unimportant_ in the face of Dick’s inevitable death.

Ra’s shrugged, a little dismissive gesture. “One must be strong to become my Heir,” he said. “Now, how ill is the boy?”

“He’s fine,” Tiger said through gritted teeth.

Ra’s smiled at him, a cold and rotting smile.

“It has been _weeks_. He’s not fine at all.”

***

Dick had finally handed the charge of Damian off to his fencing tutor, which was baffling, because it was _real_ fencing, with the little dull sword things and the beeping and the face masks, not a euphemism for actual swordplay, and was planning on grabbing his stuff from the room he was sharing with a dozen other ‘recruits’ when Tiger slammed him into the wall.

“Ra’s knows you,” he snarled into Dick’s ear. His body was hard against his back, and a bit of stonework was jabbing into Dick’s collarbone from the wall.

“Ah,” Dick forced himself to say lightly. “Wondered about that.”

“How.”

“You know who my dad was— Ra’s al Ghul’s greatest rival and all of that? Ra’s isn’t _stupid_ , and you guys _said_ the Hypnos might not work—”

“Why does he want you dead?”

Dick froze. “He… shouldn’t? Not more than he wants everyone in general dead, at least. I mean, he invited my— the next youngest Robin to rule at his side, so...”

Tiger pulled away, and Dick turned warily to face him. He prodded at the clothing he was wearing, and, grimacing, Tiger fixed it for him.

Dick frowned at him. “What was that about? How come you think Ra’s wants me dead?”

“We have to leave.” Tiger was looking around. “You need to get out— I don’t care what kind of collateral this comes with. The mission is over.”

Dick nodded, because being around a Ra’s who was out for his blood wasn’t exactly his idea of a great day, but then he shook his head.

“Damian—”

“Forget the boy!” Tiger snarled, his eyes snapping furious. “Forget… Agent, we need you out of here _right now_.”

Dick opened his mouth to reply, but there was noise from down the hall, a cut off cry of rage and pain. A noise from the fencing salle Dick had just dropped Damian off at.

Dick forgot Tiger entirely and turned to race back into the salle.

Damian was on his side, bleeding, and Dick shoved the fussing tutor aside to pry off the practice armor, the mask, and check his pulse.

It was weak, a slow, barely perceptible thrum that had Dick’s heart in his throat.

“What did you do?” Dick demanded. “Where did you hurt him?”

“Will,” Tiger was saying, and Dick could tell that he had his knife out and was menacing the tutor. “Will, there’s nothing you can do for him. It wasn’t them, it was the Pit.”

“What?” Dick said, fumbling with Damian’s clothes to get at his chest, to find out where the blood was coming from. “What do you mean? The Pit heals you. I mean, it makes you crazy, but it—”

Damian’s chest had been smooth, scarless, and pristine yesterday when Dick had helped him change. Today it— the remnants of an ugly wound were there, blood flowing sluggishly from it, and Dick thought for a second he was having a nightmare.

He’d had _this_ one often enough, the sight and smell and sound of Damian dying from being stabbed through the chest something that Dick knew had scarred him in ways even Bruce couldn’t pretend to understand. He’d been _helpless_ , and he was helpless here again.

“Ro— Damian,” Dick said. “Little D, c’mon.”

Damian flickered open eyes that glowed an otherworldly green and snarled wordlessly at Dick, a monstrous parody of what Dick had wanted to see.

A nightmare, Dick thought. All of it.

“Count to ten,” Dick advised. “Breathe. It’s okay,” he added, even though it really, really wasn’t.

“I’m not dreaming,” Dick said a moment later. Tiger made a low noise that was probably supposed to be reassuring, and clamped his hand around Dick’s shoulder.

Dick watched as Damian shut his eyes, and then he carefully picked him up.

Tiger was watching him, no expression showing on his face.

“You said Ra’s wanted me dead,” Dick said. “Damian said the same thing. I want to talk to him.”

Tiger looked like he wanted to argue, but after a second he just shook his head. “He is probably in the throne room, now,” Tiger offered. After a second, he added. “Where I should be. Come, then. If you must.”

Damian made a little snarling noise and he reached for Dick’s throat with weakly curled hands. “Deep breaths,” Dick advised. “You’re better than this. I know you are.”

“No one is better than this,” Tiger said coolly.

Dick turned an icy glare on him and he opened his mouth, shook his head, and nodded at the door.

***

Tiger was reasonably certain he had been able to tell Dick ‘no’ at some point in their relationship. He _has_ to have been able to; it’s insane that he feels so powerless against the fierce determination that Dick is forever presenting him with.

It’s… It was _out of character_ , and embarrassing to boot, but still, he stalked through the ancient stone hallways of Nanda Parbat with Dick close on his heels, leading the man to what would surely be his death.

The room went silent at their entrance, and a lazy flick of Ra’s’s hand dismissed everyone but his two guards, broad and silent. Tiger remembered that having been his place once, but now—

Dick brushed past Tiger when he stopped to kneel, and settled Damian at the foot of the the throne.

“What the hell did you do to him?” Dick demanded, his tone carrying. Neither guard reacted, but Tiger had to bite his tongue to stop himself from interfering. It was too late, all of it. He’d wanted to protect Grayson, but Grayson had never wanted protection, and this… this was what _trying_ led to.

“Will Thompson,” Ra’s said, and the way he said the name made Tiger feel slightly ill.

 _”Do you know who he is?”_ Ra’s had asked, and Tiger _wondered_ : did anyone?

“He’s dying,” Dick said, crossing his arms over his chest. “You brought him back, you brought— The Pit has brought enough people back. _Fix him_.”

“I can’t,” Ra’s said.

Dick _growled_. “You _will_. I’ll make you.”

Ra’s al Ghul laughed, and Tiger felt his blood run cold.

“My daughter thought she could raise an Heir for _him_ ,” he said, sounding _amused_ and Tiger had only heard him sound like this before punishing traitors or killing spies. “But he had _you_ all along.”

Dick shifted his weight, settling solidly in place in a manner that seemed entirely out of character to Tiger, but just made Ra’s smile. “Yes,” Dick said. “Damn him to hell for it, but _yes_.”

“You deserve the truth, at least,” Ra’s replied in mournful tones. “Though, it will hurt you.”

“I think I can handle it,” Dick said coolly. “But if you can’t fix this, you should know: I _will_.”

“I wish, more than anything, for that to be possible, but you can’t. No one can. The Lazarus Pit restores life, you know this. But it comes at a price.”

 

“He’s not insane,” Dick snapped, and Tiger wondered if they were talking about the same boy, the cold, collected killer who had been raised in these tunnels.

No one in the League was sane. Not even the two of them.

“Close,” Ra’s said. “As close as Batman came, at least. But that isn’t it, not exactly. The Pit demands blood; they say that if you provide it the blood of the one who wronged you, that it will be satisfied, but I have not been able to test it. Barring that sacrifice, it is… insatiable.”

“That’s why—” Dick dropped to his knees and curled his fingers around Damian’s hand. Damian whined and shifted, but his eyes were closed tightly. “That’s why his bodyguards try to kill him. You tell them this?”

“He won’t kill without cause,” Ra’s replied. “Your doing, I am informed. Daily.”

Tiger stared at them, wondering. The piece of the puzzle that he was missing seemed _just_ out of reach. The one piece of information that would make this entire exchange make sense.

Then, Damian whined, clear and desperate and frightened: “Nightwing?”

And when Dick replied, he sounded utterly broken. “I’m right here, Robin. I’ve got you, partner. I’ll fix this.”

“You died,” Damian said. “You left me alone.”

“Nah, you know how it is for us Robins; death doesn’t stick—”

Dick looked up at Ra’s then, and everything that had been strong and sure in his posture melted out of him. “Jason too?” he asked.

Tiger had a brief memory, the flick of a file folder with a bright-eyed boy and a date of death that had hurt for even Tiger to think about. He should have paid more attention to the briefs about Dick’s family, remembered enough to help, not just to hurt.

“Yes,” Ra’s said, resettling his robes around him. “Though you should know I was against the entire fruitless exercise.”

“But you did it to Damian,” Dick said.

Ra’s snorted. “Damian Wayne is more _my_ Heir than he is Batman’s, and _you_ are living proof of that.”

 _Robin_ , Tiger thought, awed and horror-struck.

“I’ll fix it.”

“You could put his hand around a knife hilt and use the blade to slit your throat,” Ra’s suggested.

Robin was everything to Richard Grayson, and that meant—

“There’s a cure,” Tiger heard himself say aloud, and Dick’s focus snapped back to him, and he looked utterly wrecked. “They say there’s a cure, if we seek out the All-Caste, and, I… I’ve never looked for it.”

“Fairytales,” Ra’s spat dismissively. Tiger wondered how he could be so certain.

“I’m taking him with me,” Dick said.

“Very well,” Ra’s replied. “Tiger, when your friend finally submits to the inevitable, I’ll thank you to return my grandson to me before reporting back to your masters. I don’t suppose you would accept my offer of an escort?”

“Go to hell,” Dick said, but it sounded hollow. He gently pulled Damian back into his arms before standing up.

Ra’s waved a dismissal, and Tiger rose to feet he couldn’t feel and trailed along in Dick’s wake.

***

“Where are we going?” Dick finally asked. Tiger had set up the fire, and Dick had gotten Damian’s chest bandaged up as best as he could. The line of stitches on Damian’s cheek were red and inflamed, but he couldn’t deal with the idea of an infection just then.

Even though an infection _there_ might cost Damian his sight.

“Tibet,” Tiger said, sounding a little wry.

Dick laughed, because he was supposed to, but it didn’t feel right in his belly. 

“Don’t tell me we’re going to _walk_ to Tibet,” Dick said. “That’s like… days of walking. I don’t — I don’t think Damian has days.”

Tiger’s lips parted as if he wanted to say something, but then he shook his head.

“Look, Tiger,” Dick said. “If — if it comes down to it, you have to get him home. Batman’ll… if you tell him the League is after you because you took him, he’ll make sure you’re safe. But Batman’s the only person who can fix this, if we can’t find your cure.”

Tiger didn’t reply, and Dick sighed. “There… there is a cure, right?”

Tiger finally shifted, and his gaze glittered in the firelight. “Grayson, I don’t know if the cure is real, if there is such a thing as the All-Caste, if this will work at all,” he whispered. “But I do know that if it is, you will find it.” He laughed, and it sounded strange, distant. None of the warmth Dick had thought they were starting to share. “You excel at defying the odds, don’t you?”

“I — I never thought about it like that,” Dick replied.

“No, you wouldn’t, would you? You just _act_.”

Dick shrugged. He had a vague desire to apologize, but as he wouldn’t know what the apology was for, he didn’t.

Empty apologies were stupid.

“You must have been so happy to see him alive,” Tiger said. “I’m sorry it was… this.”

“I’m not,” Dick said. “I… I never told you what happened, did I?”

Tiger shifted instead of replying, but then his hand was brushing against Dick’s, a quiet, reassuring gesture that Dick would never have credited to the bloodthirsty agent even a few months ago. His fingers closed around Tiger’s, and he bit his lip.

“I was the only one who knew he was there, and he… he was trying to distract the guy who was attacking him from coming after me. I watched the whole thing.”

Tiger breathed out a low sigh, and his fingers clenched tight around Dick’s.

“Do you ever wonder what god we pissed on in our past lives to bring us this?” Tiger asked ruefully.

“I don’t know about any of that,” Dick replied. “I think the highs make up for the lows.”

Damian whimpered in his sleep and Dick reached with his free hand to smooth his hair.

“We’ll hitchhike to Gilgit, and then we will steal a car,” Tiger said after a long silence. 

“Fan-fucking tastic,” Dick replied, but he was smiling.

***

“Wouldn’t it be faster if we fly?” Grayson was asking as they bumped along a dirt road in the bed of an ancient pickup truck. Tiger leaned over his shoulder to see the map Dick was looking at, and then grunted.

Grayson twisted to make a face at Tiger, but they were too close for Tiger to see anything but his too-blue eyes, so he kissed his cheek and drew back a little, grinning.

Dick leaned back against him. Damian was mostly-unconscious in his lap, the maps spread out across his back. If it weren’t for the dire peril (or perhaps the danger just added to the headiness of the moment,) Tiger might feel entirely at home like this.

“Well, we could go to Islamabad and then fly to Lhasa, but the last time I did that it took over a day. And we’d have to drive even further. I think it would take longer, but we could try it.”

Dick sighed heavily. The sound was mostly stolen by the noise of the truck and the mountain winds, but Tiger could feel it in his posture. He wrapped his arm around Grayson’s chest and dropped his free hand to Damian’s head, curling his fingers through his hair.

It was odd, he thought. He was still having trouble reconciling the image in his head of the bloodthirsty child he’d heard so much about with the youngest brother Dick had rarely mentioned but always, always smiled over.

He’d seen a little of Damian, even before Dick had caught Ra’s’s attention and everything had crumbled apart, and in no way did the boy seem like the sort of person Dick would smile fondly over memories of, the sort of person who could break Dick’s heart by dying.

But then, Tiger knew better than many that Dick was careless with his love.

Still, Damian al Ghul seemed an unworthy recipient, even pitiful as he was now, dying all over again in Dick’s arms.

But then, Tiger had no room to stand in that respect, and it was better that he not voice such things aloud.

One day, Dick would realize that Tiger was selfish, and a killer, and Tiger would be upset, but he was prepared for it.

As prepared as he could be.

“Perhaps we should have accepted the Demon’s Head’s assistance,” Tiger said after a long silence. Dick was shivering a little; he’d wrapped Damian up in his jacket and wasn’t dressed properly for the climate.

One more thing Tiger would have to obtain on his own once they reached Gilgit, he thought. Dick had taken out his Hypnos in Damian’s room while Tiger had packed, and Tiger had hesitated before doing the same, but in the end, he’d already decided his loyalty lay more with Grayson than with Spyral.

Despite the years he’d worked for them, they’d never once done anything to inspire him to _protect_ them, and Dick—

Dick actually needed someone to watch his back, since he was so busy watching everyone else’s.

Tiger resettled the three of them so that he could wrap his own clothes around Dick and used Damian to cover up the rest of him; the fever ought to be good for _something_ , at least, and when Dick finally drifted off, Tiger allowed himself to relax, to contemplate the future.

Damian made a low, pained noise and Tiger rubbed his thumb over the boy’s uninjured cheek and frowned.

There All-Caste was supposed to be able to cleanse the corruption of the Pit, their sanctuary hidden in the mountains of Tibet, right on the cusp of the Karakoram.

There was supposed to be a _cure_.

He wondered if Dick would be better off with Tiger dead at Damian’s hand, or Damian dead at his, and knew that he had only a few days left to decide.

***

“We can’t take a bus,” Damian heard. His skin was clammy and his clothing was rough and uncomfortable.

Also, his chest ached in a deep and terrifying way, but that was not important. He couldn’t think about that, because that was the stuff of nightmares, and he was sure he was awake.

“Well, I’m not stealing a car from these people,” Grayson said hotly, and Damian grimaced. He loathed when Grayson took that sort of tone; it meant that no one would be able to make him see sense, and also that he would probably toss Damian over his shoulder and drag him away, which made Damian think about his chest again and clutch at it.

Grayson’s hand closed around his wrist and pried his hand away from his chest. “I’m pretty sure whoever we stole it from would lose their income and starve to death if we do.”

“We can’t take _Damian_ on a bus. I can get us travel papers in an hour, but no one will let him on a bus when he’s like this.”

Grayson dabbed at his chest and the pain ratcheted up several degrees in intensity, so he arched and had to use his free hand to stifle his cry.

“He’s conscious,” Grayson said.

Damian forced himself to open his eyes, even though he knew that would make Grayson go away, replace him with whoever had taken Will’s place as his bodyguard, would end the _good_ parts of the dream. He stared at Grayson’s profile and dropped his hand from his mouth in shock.

“So he is,” the Tiger King of Kandahar replied, and he cupped a hand behind Damian’s head and pressed the rim of a cup to his lips. Damian sipped, and was relieved to taste tea. He took the cup from Tiger, and Tiger smiled a small, pained grimace. His thumb rubbed a soothing pattern on his skull and Damian wanted to sit up properly to get away from the casual touch, but Grayson was still doing something to his aching chest.

“Maybe he can just ride it out? Maybe it’s just a flaw in the magic or something, not the — not what Ra’s said,” Grayson added. “Damian, you feeling better?”

“I’m fine,” Damian gritted out.

Grayson paused, one hand pressing something soft into the aching center of his chest, and he examined Damian’s face. “Liar,” he said, but with none of the fond amusement he was supposed to have in his voice.

“Did Grandfather find you too?” Damian asked. “I remember—” he’d fallen while fencing, he thought. It wasn’t the sort of thing Grandfather might reward, but, then, Ra’s al Ghul wasn’t known for his rational thought processes. “I don’t remember,” he corrected, greatly daring. The Tiger King of Kandahar might judge his weakness, but Grayson never would.

“Drink,” Tiger said. “Also, good news, now we have someone who speaks Urdu.”

“You don’t speak Urdu?” Damian asked. Tiger tipped the cup up more and Damian had to swallow or drown.

“Yes,” Grayson said. “Apparently they don’t in Kandahar. I feel like this should have occurred to me sooner, but in my defense, Kandahar is only like 200 miles from here. So I’ve been playing the clueless American tourist. Do you know how many American tourists they have here?”

Damian looked around. They were in a dilapidated room with the windows closed, and he shook his head.

He wanted to reach for his chest again, against the pulsating pain there. “Where are we?”

“Gilgit,” Tiger and Dick replied simultaneously.

Damian frowned. “Grayson,” he whispered, blinking away a darkness that was threatening to take away his senses again. “Did you kidnap me from my grandfather?”

“Not… exactly,” Grayson replied. “Don’t worry about it. How about you just keep breathing for me instead?”

“Grandfather will kill you,” Damian managed to say, but his lungs weren’t working quite right and the fever that must have overtaken him in his fencing lessons threatened to overwhelm him again.

The ceiling spun above him, but he refused to close his eyes against the nauseating whirl.

“Yeah?” Grayson said. “Everyone keeps saying that, but he hasn’t yet. If you need to pass out, Damian, you should.”

Damian grunted dismissal of that advice. “If we are in Gilgit, you need me.”

“Dami—” Grayson whispered, low and heartfelt, and he shifted, Tiger taking over pressing against his chest, Grayson moving to support his head and neck. More tea was pressed to his mouth, and Damian squirmed, trying to sit up. “Hush. I’ve got to get as much fluid into you as I can while you’re conscious.”

“Where are we going?” Damian demanded. “I don’t want to see father. I — I failed, and—”

“Not yet, Damian,” Grayson said. “We’re going to an ancient magic Tibetan monastery to set you to rights first. And then we can go wherever you want to go. You want to go to Japan? They have the best Disneyland in Japan. I never did get to take you to Disney, did I?”

Damian struggled against the warm assault of Grayson’s voice against his consciousness, but eventually the fever and pain reclaimed him, and he was alone in his nightmares again.

***

“800 miles,” Tiger told Dick while Dick was trying to make himself understood to a bank employee.

“What?” Dick said, turning back to Tiger for a moment.

“It’s 800 miles from here to Kandahar,” Tiger replied, wondering, not for the first time, why he’d even looked it up.

It wasn’t like Kandahar had been any kind of home for him — it was a badge of honor. A place he had survived just long enough to join the League, not a home, not like…

Not a place with a family.

“Hmm,” Dick replied.

The bank manager reappeared with a young woman whose eyes were huge and awed at the sight of Dick. “I speak English!” she announced eagerly.

“That’s awesome,” Dick replied, flashing a grin at her. “Okay, great. So I’ve lost my wallet, but I have a friend in the States who can wire me money. I just need a place to send the money to and a way to call him.”

Tiger was still of the opinion that this was a very bad plan, but he didn’t have anything better to offer, since apparently stealing was off the table now.

“Oh!” she replied, and then she gestured at them to follow her, and they made their way into an office. “You can use the telephone,” she said.

Dick flashed his usual grin at her and Tiger wanted to bristle, which was stupid and wouldn’t get them anywhere, and besides, Tiger had never _wanted_ to be the sole recipient of Dick’s affections.

Dick went immediately to the phone and started dialling, and the woman turned to Tiger. “It’s late for climbing,” she said, and Tiger stared at her without comprehension for several long moments.

“Yes!” he replied suddenly, realizing what she meant. “We’re here to look at the mountains, not climb them. He hates… climbing.”

That had been eloquent, Tiger though viciously. One might think he’d never had to _lie_ before.

She giggled appealingly and glanced at Dick, who was frowning in conversation. _”Timmy, I thought you knew I was still alive!”_ was audible, and she frowned, so Tiger tried to reclaim the conversational thread.

“Are there any good places to stop and look?” he asked her. “Or bad places?”

“I can give you a guidebook,” she said cheerfully. Then she looked stricken. “It’s written in Farsi though.”

Tiger suppressed a snort. He wanted to say something about _Urdu_ not being _Farsi_ , but it would be pointless.

He was playing the clueless American tourist, though, and while it wasn’t a role he was used to, that was hardly an excuse to let it slip over pride in language that wasn’t even his native tongue. He was a far better spy than Grayson, after all.

“Tim, I need money. Please, just send me money. I will explain as soon as I get home, I swear to you, I just—”

There was a long silence. “I assumed you hacked his files,” Dick said finally, sounding defeated. “You _always_ — yes, yes, swift code, bank address, got it.”

The woman turned and deftly handed Dick a deposit slip, and then she got that stricken look on her face again and made as if to take it back.

“The numbers are the same, right?” Dick asked, sounding distracted. “Not you, Tim — I was — I have someone with me is all.”

Tiger shrugged. “Mostly,” he replied, thinking of the curling edges of the numbers on the streets, the way they looked just very slightly _wrong_ , and the woman slipped back away from Dick.

Dick smiled at either Tiger or the bank employee, and Tiger let out a gusty sigh as Dick started reading off the slip.

***

It was easier, Dick thought, just _knowing_ that Tim knew the truth now. Tim, of course, had been livid, but not livid enough to stop him from wiring them $8,000.00 US which the bank hadn’t been able to cash out entirely with funds on-hand, so now Dick Grayson had a bank account in Gilgit, which was not something he had ever expected to happen in his life, but that was just part of being a Bat.

Tiger was upset about something, and normally Dick would try to pry it out of him, try to _help_ , but Damian was dying by pieces in a rented house in a city that didn’t have a proper _sewage_ system, so he was a little bit distracted.

“So, the bus runs through at 3,” Dick said as they opened the door. “That gives us about an hour to get any supplies we need and clean clothes for Damian.”

The smell of death was sickly and cloying in the tiny room, but Damian was a little bit awake again, watching the two of them through slitted eyes.

“Missed you,” Dick said, dropping to his knees at Damian’s side and brushing his hair out of his eyes.

“How long?” Damian demanded, though his voice was nowhere near as strident as he probably hoped it sounded.

“Forty-five minutes,” Dick said. “I got Tim to wire me some cash, so we can go out partying on his dime.”

Damian tried to smirk, and Dick thought it was a damned good showing. “Burgers on Drake,” he whispered.

“Exactly. Veggie-patty for you, of course.”

“Grandfather says that my maudlin sentimentality isn’t to be tolerated,” Damian replied.

“Huh?” Dick said, trying to track the shift in topics.

“For dumb beasts,” Damian added, and Dick felt something awful and cruel shift inside him at that.

“Shh,” Dick said. “None of that. Or what will Alfred do with all the vegan recipes he’s worked so hard on perfecting?”

His fist was clenched tight, and he turned to Tiger. “Please,” Dick said. “You have to promise me you won’t take him back there.”

Tiger was right there in a moment, and his arm was heavy and hard around Dick’s shoulders. “Should anything happen to you, I will deliver him to Wayne Manor with all care,” Tiger said, and Damian frowned at them. “I swear it, Richard Grayson.”

He pressed a kiss into the secret spot at Dick’s hairline he preferred, and Dick shuddered. “Good,” Dick said, and he felt like some of the fury he was feeling must have leaked into his tone, but neither Tiger nor Damian seemed to notice it.

***

They got off the bus at the first village it passed through over the border.

Damian was no longer getting enough oxygen. His nailbeds had been blue for hours, and he no longer responded to any external stimulus. The brief coherency from Gilgit was almost like a dream.

Tiger was carrying a backpack with enough supplies to get them where they were going (he hoped) and Dick was carrying Damian tied to his back.

Tiger was somewhat convinced that the only reason Damian was still alive was because Dick had willed it so. It took him an hour and a half past sunset before he could convince Dick to make camp for the night.

Dick fell asleep almost immediately, and Tiger stared at Damian’s still form, watching the slight rise and fall of his chest that meant he was still alive, wishing there were some other solution.

Something more real than a story someone had told Tiger once, when he’d been a boy who could still dream.

Tiger took out a knife and stared at the blade.

Damian was suddenly on top of him, snarling like a mad creature, grappling for the knife. He cut his fingers on the blade, and Tiger was acutely aware of the hot, slick sensation of blood sliding over his hand.

Damian got him pinned for the space of a heartbeat, but even possessed by the Pit, he was still _dying_ , and Tiger could flip him over and hold him down, the knife-point quivering at Damian’s throat.

It would be a quick death, he thought, merciful. Not this drawn out fevered madness, killing a child over again by inches.

It would be _right_ , and Dick would even forgive him, because he was _Dick_ and that’s what Dick _did_.

“Please,” Damian sobbed out hoarsely. “I don’t want to kill _him_.”

And Tiger… Tiger didn’t want him to kill Dick anymore than Damian did, but that wasn’t what they were doing.

There had to be a cure, had to be a truth behind the myth that Tiger hadn’t truly believed even when he had been young and foolish and soppy with sentiment and weak with caring.

“I won’t let that happen,” Tiger said, though he couldn’t be sure that Damian had heard, or if he had heard that he had understood, because he was back to bare-living, shallow slow breathes and a gaping chest wound that was un-healing despite Grayson’s single-minded efforts to stop it.

Tiger took bandaging from his pack and wrapped Damian’s hands, and then, just to be certain, he bound them.

He needed to stop making stupid promises, he thought, and start figuring out what sort of future he had now that he had defected from Spyral for a pretty man’s asking, and had sworn to Dick that he wouldn’t bring Damian back to Nanda Parbat and the League.

***

The next afternoon was cold and windy, and they came upon the secret temple abruptly. One moment, Dick had been focusing on his footing and his burden, and the next moment, he looked up and there it was.

The architecture was reminiscent of the tunnels of Nanda Parbat, for all it was open to the elements. It seemed imposing even in the bright cold sunlight, but Dick wouldn’t be deterred, not now, not ever again.

He hitched Damian up higher so he could feel those wispy breaths on his cheek and strode for the shadowed entrance in the nearest wall.

He was met with swords, which startled him, and he jerked back, hoping to keep himself from being surrounded, hoping to keep Damian from being stabbed, and Tiger drew steel to match and flowed around him to defend.

“Wait,” Dick said, voice hoarse from exertion, from exhaustion. “Please. I need help. Dami — my brother needs help. Please.”

All but one sword was lowered, and Tiger kept his body between it and Dick, and then a _truly_ more, he reminded himself.

“He needs the cleansing,” Tiger said, and the woman murmured something low and urgent to the men who’d taken Damian.

“A child?” she asked. “I think you must tell me this story.”

Dick wanted to protest, but she interrupted him before he could corral his thoughts.

“He will be cared for,” she said. “ _A child_ ,” she repeated, dismayed.

She led them down a corridor that echoed the outside architecture, and Tiger kept looking around.

Dick was too tired to be interested in his surroundings, though he was relieved that Tiger was paying attention. After a few twists of the corridor, Tiger slowed his pace to match Dick’s and shoved a shoulder under his arm.

“Want me to carry you, Agent?” he asked, a quirk to his lips that had been missing for the last few days.

 _He didn’t really believe in this place,_ Dick realized.

Dick tried to smile back, and Tiger urged him faster so they could keep up with the woman.

***

Tiger was deadly certain that the only reason this place existed was because Dick had needed it to. At some point, centuries past, the place had popped into being simply because Richard Motherfucking Grayson would need it to be a real place right now.

Tiger really hated that about Dick, sometimes.

The woman offered them tea, and Dick took it, grimacing as he sipped it, the way he had in Gilgit, the way he probably had in Nanda Parbat.

“There is a story here,” the woman said. “I will need to know it if I am to help your brother.”

Dick grimaced harder. “The first thing is, I lied. Earlier. He’s not _technically_ my brother.”

Tiger snorted his disagreement. Dick was a generous man, sure, but the things he had done so far for Damian were clearly the actions of family.

“Your lover disagrees,” the woman said primly, setting her cup neatly on the table and shifting the samovar slightly, smiling at Tiger.

Tiger wanted to know why everyone seemed to be able to figure out that he was… that Dick was… that they were _fucking_ just by looking at him.

It was frustrating: he wasn’t supposed to be so easily read.

“He’s…” Dick shook his head. “I don’t know what to tell you, I just… I want your help. I need — _he_ needs your help.”

“Start at the beginning,” the woman coaxed, and Dick cleared his throat, and _did_.

“He was so _angry_ ,” Dick said of the little boy who had fallen into his lap along with the Batman mantle and the _impossible_ responsibilities he’d been given.

And Spyral had thought that Bruce Wayne had simply gone on a long sabbatical of some sort. Hah!

After awhile, after hearing every bit of affection that Dick had in him trotted out for display to this strange woman, she poured everyone more tea, and Dick didn’t grimace this time as he drank it down.

“And then he died. Talia — his mother, that is. I guess I forgot about her. She… I think something went wrong, somewhere, and she thought that threatening to kill him would make him come home? She loved him too,” Dick said with an impossible surety. Tiger had met Talia al Ghul, and the woman could no more feel love than any of them.

“Talia?” the woman interrupted. “I know Talia. Surely she did not—”

“ _She_ didn’t,” Dick reassured. “She had taken Damian’s DNA and cloned him. It was… grotesque. And I think, in the end, the clone was just jealous.”

Tiger stood up.

Both of them stared at him, and he shook his head, unable to voice aloud the thoughts swarming in his head: foremost of which was that Dick’s irrepressible need to ascribe rational emotions to the monsters in his life made him sick to his stomach.

The woman nodded at him, and he left the room.

One of the monks, or whatever they were, was waiting at the door, and seemed unsurprised to see him.

His hand was taken and he was led back through the maze of corridors to a room with some kind of altar, to Damian lying naked and un-living on cold stone.

“That can’t be good for him,” Tiger said, but no one in the room paid him any mind, so he circled chanting men in gray robes until he was behind the altar, and then he settled down against it and wrapped his hand around Damian’s.

They’d removed the bandages, and the cuts were rough against Tiger’s skin, but Dick would have held the kid’s hand, and instead of here with Damian he was in the other room spilling his guts to a strange woman based on a fairytale and half a promise, and…

Tiger was useless to him, right now, but he could hold Damian’s hand, since Dick couldn’t.

It wasn’t like he had any reason to avoid holding the hand of a killer, any moral ground to stand on in that respect, and besides, Damian was, after all, a child.

At least, according to the woman, and according to Dick, and…

And his palm had started bleeding more, in the time Tiger had been holding it; the slow sluggish slide of already-cool blood speeding up, going warm and living and real.

When Grayson joined him later, minutes or hours of interrogation and chanting weighing on them both, Damian whispered his name. “I thought you were a hallucination,” he said, and Grayson’s hand wrapped around Tiger’s and Damian’s both.

Tiger felt hope claw up in his chest where none had existed before.

 _This_ was what being around Richard Grayson meant.

Success was _inevitable._

***

_Epilogue: Disney_

The Dole Whip is too sweet, Damian thinks, but he eats it anyway, licking the pineapple not-quite-ice cream off of his spoon and watching Grayson as he explains the nuance of some important Disney classic to Tiger, who isn’t quite smiling at Grayson, but looks like he would want to, if smiling weren’t just another weapon in his arsenal.

Damian still doesn’t quite trust him, even though Grayson does. He’s heard too many stories, is the thing.

He knows that Tiger feels the same way about him.

“I’m gonna go grab more burgers,” Grayson announced. “You’re still all peaky, Damian.” He ruffles Damian’s hair as he leaves, and Damian flinches, suppresses the overwhelming desire to retaliate with blood.

Calms.

Tiger is watching him, and Damian offers him the plastic cup with the treat in it.

The employees — _cast members_ — are watching them surreptitiously. Grayson had said it was because Damian is famous, but Damian thinks it is because they recognize him and Tiger for what they are.

Tiger takes it, making a face when he licks the spoon. He takes another bite though, so maybe he likes it the way Damian likes it. Too-sweet, but perhaps better for that.

“How is your chest?” Tiger asks, handing the treat back. Somewhere, a child starts screaming, Tiger jerks to look, then settles back down again.

Damian is pleased he kept his own reaction completely suppressed.

“I’m fine,” Damian tells him. He wants to rub at the aching spot just below his sternum, where the hole has scarred over.

He will never be as he was before dying, before being resurrected, before _killing_ to stay alive.

(He’s not certain whether knowing that he was killing to survive makes the knowledge more bearable. He thinks it does not.)

“You’ve let him take you to every Disney on the planet, now,” Tiger says. “He’s going to take you home, next.”

Damian doesn’t want to go. He still believes, even though Grayson has tried to explain, to convince him otherwise, that his father is responsible for the death of his mother, for Grayson’s death, for the things that caught him up in Grandfather’s clutches.

“It is inevitable,” Damian replies. Tiger looks like he might argue, then stills.

Damian still believes that he will be found wanting by a father who had, he felt, never truly wanted him.

Someone else starts sobbing, an adult this time, and Damian turns, sees a woman with four children in line at the counter, patting at her clothes and peering into her purse.

“She lost her wallet,” Tiger says, eyes narrowed. Damian turns back to him and Grayson returns with a tray, kissing Tiger and squeezing Damian’s shoulder as he slides into the seat between them.

Grayson settles in and then peers around for the source of the woman’s upset.

“Her wallet?” he asks. “I can — I can help her. Come on Damian,” he says.

“I don’t speak Pashto,” Damian replies primly, licking at his spoon again. The sweetness is growing on him: he might even let Grayson buy him another later.

“You don’t?” Tiger asks, but he stands up and offers Grayson a hand.

“We grew up 800 miles apart,” Damian reminds him, and something shifts in Tiger’s stance.

When they come back, Damian’s finished with his treat and almost done with his burger, and Grayson beams at him.

“You know,” he says. “I grew up almost a thousand miles from here but I don’t have any problems speaking the language.”

Damian snorts.

“Really,” Tiger says dryly, but he throws an arm around Grayson.

Damian narrows his eyes at the man, hating his casual affection. After a moment, Grayson drags him in for a hug.

Damian protests, “Wait, don’t—” but Grayson doesn’t listen to his words, he only listens to the things Damian’s body is telling him as it curls into the protective warmth of Grayson’s hold.

“Aww,” someone says. “You should let me get a picture for you guys! You make such a cute family.”

Dick extracts his phone from his pocket and leans around Damian to hand it to the stranger, and Damian keeps his eyes shut against his embarrassment.

He can feel Grayson’s lips against the crown of his head for a brief moment, and then Grayson is laughing and the phone is handed back.

“Thanks!” he hollers.

Damian adjusts Grayson’s grip on him so that his palm is covering the center of his chest, where it hurts the most, and Grayson presses down hard for a sublime moment.

“I’ve got you,” he says, “Partner.”

**Author's Note:**

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> You can check out more of Pentapus's artwork [on her tumblr!](pentapus.tumblr.com)  
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